"Methyl iodide
is a chemical that EPA is now evaluating for registration as a replacement for
the fumigant methyl bromide, which is being phased out because it causes ozone
depletion in the atmosphere. Methyl iodide and methyl bromide are highly
volatile fumigant pesticides that are injected into the soil to kill soil-borne
pests. Because of the high application rates and gaseous nature of these
chemicals, they drift away from the application site to poison neighbors and
farmworkers. Fumigant-intensive crops include tomatoes, strawberries, peppers,
tobacco, melons, potatoes and other root crops. FLOC workers are involved with
such crops, and we all eat them.

"Methyl iodide
is even more hazardous to human health than methyl bromide. Cancer researchers
have used methyl iodide in laboratories to induce cancer. California lists it as
a carcinogen under Proposition 65. EPA found that methyl iodide caused thyroid
tumors, and evidence linked to metabolic disorders and immune function,
respiratory tract lesions, neurological effects, and miscarriages."

More
background on this threat, as well as information about how to participate in
the public comment on the EPA proposed change, can be found in the linked story
mentioned above.

A Little Good News From the Constitution
State
One complaint I get about these columns is that they always seem so negative.
Unfortunately, I don’t create the news; I only review it. While negative is the
prevailing drift there are some bright spots here and there to encourage us to
keep up the good fight.

The
Connecticut Independent Labor Union, which is affiliated with the United
Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE), showed us a good example
of the results of effective organizing this past week.

First, there
was a landslide win in an election to represent Stamford workers who drive the
city's plows and garbage trucks, maintain golf courses and fix city vehicles.
The Teamsters had spoken for these workers for over a half-century but had
accomplished little. The UE won 82 percent of the vote. 87 percent of those
eligible participated in the voting. The city now knows they are dealing with a
solid union, not just some well dressed official.

The very next
day, the same union won a unanimous vote to represent a similar
bargaining unit for the town of Cromwell.

Social Security I
(In the spirit of full disclosure I must acknowledge that Social Security
payments are my sole source of regular income.)

The White
House budget submitted to congress includes a major proposal to privatize Social
Security. It didn’t make the cut for the final draft of President Bush’s State
of the Union Address and has been largely ignored by pundits of all stripes.

By 2010 the
process of shifting no less than 710 billion dollars of Social Security funds
out of secure government holdings into private accounts would begin. Regardless
of how the market fares this means a bonanza for stock brokers and money
managers--subsidized by precious Social Security dollars. It also means putting
the retirement future of account holders at risk.

But wait,
there’s more! According to the Alliance for Retired Americans the budget would
also,

* End benefits
at age 16 for the child of a deceased, disabled or retired worker if that child
is no longer attending school full time. Savings over 10 years: $1.5 billion.

* Eliminate
the $255 death benefit paid to surviving spouses or entitled children of a
beneficiary who dies. Savings: $2.0 billion.

* Increase
enforcement of an existing law that reduces benefits for public sector workers
who receive a pension from work not covered by Social Security (the Government
Pension Offset, or GPO, and Windfall Elimination Provision, or WEP). Savings:
$2.4 billion.

* Change the
reduction in disability benefits that applies to beneficiaries who also receive
workers' compensation payments. Savings: $0.4 billion, although the Social
Security Administration (SSA) intends to revise it so that savings are zero.

But even
that’s not all. The budget cuts Medicare by 36 billion and Medicaid by 13.7
billion over the next five years. And, cuts in the Older Americans Act and
various block grant programs will decimate services such as Meals On Wheels,
adult day care, and transportation assistance.

All of the
savings at the expense of us old codgers will be diverted to the greatly
expanded war budget.

Social Security II
I was somewhat puzzled after reading a PAI account of a speech by Change to Win
chair Anna Burger to the Rainbow/PUSH Wall Street Project Conference. Burger
gave a good description of the pension crisis facing U.S. workers. But then she
kind of lost me with talk about a whole new pension system that "would be unlike
both traditional pensions and more-shaky 401(k) accounts." According to the
article,

"Burger
outlined basic principles for a proposed pension system: Universal coverage;
adequate retirement income, ‘such as 70 percent of pre-retirement income’
guaranteed against market shocks, inflation and longer lives; required
predictable, stable contributions from all employers; simplicity; portability
from job to job; investment pooling to reduce risk and increase returns for
individuals, and worker election of board members who then run the system."

Except for
"investment pooling," and election of some kind of board, there is nothing here
that couldn’t be dealt with in the present Social Security system--which is
universal, portable and receives stable funding from virtually all employers.
The percentage of pre-retirement income can be raised simply by eliminating the
income cap on employee contributions and increasing the share paid by the
employer.

"Investment
pooling" is at the heart of most schemes to privatize Social Security. The best
way to guarantee against "market shocks and inflation" is to have the fund
backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government–as is Social Security
presently. This ill-considered new pension scheme is not a change that can win
for American workers.

Past
generations of union leaders dropped the ball when they first got into employer
based pension plans. We need to fight to defend–and expand–Social
Security, not just for old folks like me but for the young workers just entering
the work force as well.

Willie Nelson, Janet Jackson, and the Mine
Operators
When Janet Jackson suffered her famous "costume failure" on live television
during a Super Bowl, CBS was fined 550,000 dollars. Fines for 276 safety
violation citations at the Sago mine (where twelve miners were killed in
January) over 2004-2005 totaled 33,600.

Collectively,
mine operators owe sixteen million dollars in unpaid safety fines. MSHA says
they are stumped over how to get them to cough up. Stephen Webber, who headed
the mine agency's assessments office at the end of the Clinton administration
and for a few years under the Bush administration said "If mine operators are
not paying their civil penalty assessments, they're not going to have the right
attitude toward health and safety. 'They'll just get another assessment and not
pay it."

Coincidently,
sixteen million is what Willie Nelson was alleged to owe in income tax in 1990.
The IRS wasn’t stumped at all. They auctioned off Willie’s every possession and
told him to work to get them more.

ISP=Innovative Scams for Profit
Most of us pay somewhere between twenty to fifty bucks a month, depending on how
broad our band, to an Internet Service Provider. Presumably a chunk of this goes
to cover the expense of us both sending and receiving e-mail messages.

This column
goes out by e-mail to subscribers on five continents. We started out using our
regular e-mail account, listing the subscribers "bcc." Then our ISP (SBC, now
dba ATT), in the name of fighting spam, started restricting the number we could
copy on a message. We then contracted with a "white listed" service,
IntelliContact, which worked well for about a year.

The last
couple of months we have had delivery problems galore. Everything to AOL
subscribers has been blocked. Comcast has frequently been a problem and SBC was
on at least one mailing.

At first we
thought we were dealing with some of the all too common glitches that show up in
cyberspace that are ultimately repaired at a snail’s pace. Now we’re not so
sure.

AOL and Yahoo
announced last week plans to charge "mass mailers" to guarantee delivery past
their "spam filters." Pay the tribute and you can spam all you want.

Yahoo, Google,
and Microsoft have all admitted to collaborating with the Chinese government in
tracking down and arresting dissidents using the Internet. So far no disclosures
about how they may be ratting out American customers to U.S. spy agencies.

We can’t say
for sure that we are being pressured to pay to mail, or are victims of
government engineered disruption. With a list that still only numbers in triple
digits it would be a stretch to label us a "mass mailer." We’re not so arrogant
to think Bush is losing sleep over this web site. Still, eternal paranoia is the
price of liberty.